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Friday, 25 May 2012

Hanging Baskets with Tomatoes in

Today I managed to buy some hanging baskets to put some tomato plants in. I've been planning to do this, as part of my "how do tomatoes grow best" experiment.

So I got my hammer drill, and other tools, out and put up the brackets.

Ready for the tomato plants to be transplanted into them.

I had one and a half trays of seedlings that I had yet to pot out, and gathered some more pots

The hanging baskets, with tomato plants in them, happy in the sun.

I then potted out the rest of the tomatoes from the tray into larger pots, and I used some little clips that I bought from Wilkinsons, to attach the stems to little sticks.

Of the herbs on the Window Sill Herb Garden, the Basil and the Thyme have both started sprouting already!

Still nothing from the mint.

This is a shorted blog post tonight; I've just got in from having dinner sat in the garden appreciating just how lovely it looks and how nice it is to eat things picked from the garden (we had chives picked 10 mins before we ate them; perfection)

I do have a little more advice I need; the planters that I have started the Lettuce off in have BOTH been colonised by ants; is this going to cause me a problem and if so, how the HELL do I get rid of the little bastards?

I think that the initial premise of this blog has pretty much been proved; I still have a job and a successful business and I'm already eating food grown in my back garden, and am not far off being able to provide almost an entire meal prepared with food grown by myself - a VERY satisfying feeling indeed.

1 comment:

I've got a couple of young hundreds and thousands tomato plants awaiting transplantation to hanging baskets. Bought myself two of those large 'flower ball' baskets last year, the ones with the little windows (for seedlings) along the bottom. It'll be interesting to see if I can get a good crop from them. Also considering growing some peppers along side them (plenty of room in there, I suspect), although I may have left it a little late to grow sweet peppers from seed.

I've been told it's rather difficult to grow mint from seed, so good luck with that. I tried myself last year, but the seeds failed to germinate.

It is however dead easy to propagate mint from cuttings. I've got a couple of sprigs of chocolate mint on the go at the moment. After two days they've already developed several sizeable roots (~1cm long) and I reckon they'll be ready to transplant into soil within a week.

I've also got some lemon balm and regular mint that I shall attempt to propagate in the same manor soon. The latter from a three year old mother plant that I though succumbed to rust three years ago (and duly abandoned in a dark a secluded corner of the garden) but it's been coming back strong every year since. Little to no sign of rust either (though I'll have to double check that).

As for the ants, I was investigating slug/snail deterrents/poisons the other day when I stumbled across parasitic nematode worms sold by a company called Nemasys. They sell a product called 'No ants'. No idea how effective it is though, nor whether ants are something to be worried about w.r.t. lettuce.

P.S. Oddly enough, we have some mystery wheat growing in our front garden in a flower bed which has never been composted (at least not with home made compost). Very odd indeed, an interesting addition though. :-)

About Me

I am a normal(ish) 30ish male who is considering the benefits (and possibility) of 'homesteading' and self sufficiency while holding down a full time job AND a full time business. I hope to write about my successes and (hopefully fewer) failures here, so others can be inspired and maybe get on with it themselves.